This chapter identifies the sources of individualism and instrumentalism in European intellectual history. It offers a sketch of the current intellectual landscape, in which individualism and ...
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This chapter identifies the sources of individualism and instrumentalism in European intellectual history. It offers a sketch of the current intellectual landscape, in which individualism and instrumentalism are dominant in the US and their criticism is more strongly rooted in Europe. To counter the risk of losing a sense of a common world, which would result from the wholesale adoption of individualism–cum–instrumentalism, one must review politico–philosophical alternatives that sustain a sense of the common without falling into any a priori notions of community. With some qualification, the European attempt at world–making can be read in the light of such a search.Less

Imperial Modernism and European World-Making

Peter Wagner

Published in print: 2007-01-01

This chapter identifies the sources of individualism and instrumentalism in European intellectual history. It offers a sketch of the current intellectual landscape, in which individualism and instrumentalism are dominant in the US and their criticism is more strongly rooted in Europe. To counter the risk of losing a sense of a common world, which would result from the wholesale adoption of individualism–cum–instrumentalism, one must review politico–philosophical alternatives that sustain a sense of the common without falling into any a priori notions of community. With some qualification, the European attempt at world–making can be read in the light of such a search.

One of the most distinguished cultural and intellectual historians of our time, Frank Turner taught a landmark Yale University lecture course on European intellectual history that drew scores of ...
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One of the most distinguished cultural and intellectual historians of our time, Frank Turner taught a landmark Yale University lecture course on European intellectual history that drew scores of students over many years. His lectures—lucid, accessible, beautifully written, and delivered with a notable lack of jargon—distilled modern European history from the Enlightenment to the dawn of the twentieth century and conveyed the turbulence of a rapidly changing era in European history through its ideas and leading figures. The author, one of Turner's former students, has now edited the lectures into a single volume that outlines the thoughts of a great historian on the forging of modern European ideas. Moreover, it offers a fine example of how intellectual history should be taught: rooted firmly in historical and biographical evidence.Less

European Intellectual History from Rousseau to Nietzsche

Frank M Turner

Published in print: 2015-03-25

One of the most distinguished cultural and intellectual historians of our time, Frank Turner taught a landmark Yale University lecture course on European intellectual history that drew scores of students over many years. His lectures—lucid, accessible, beautifully written, and delivered with a notable lack of jargon—distilled modern European history from the Enlightenment to the dawn of the twentieth century and conveyed the turbulence of a rapidly changing era in European history through its ideas and leading figures. The author, one of Turner's former students, has now edited the lectures into a single volume that outlines the thoughts of a great historian on the forging of modern European ideas. Moreover, it offers a fine example of how intellectual history should be taught: rooted firmly in historical and biographical evidence.